“It’s not that pheromones don’t exist,” Drewitt says. But really, many different things can arouse many different people, so there’s never been a proven ‘pheromone recipe’ that you can just add to a fragrance.” “It’s the idea that certain molecules can have an aphrodisiac effect on people. “Pheromones are really just an idea,” Huber explains. Part of this myth has been backed up by another myth: that of pheromones. The modern perfume business has more or less been built on the vague notion that they are able to bottle the smell of desire, to improve one’s scent for optimal attraction and the trappings that come with it, like fame, fortune, or even enhanced machismo or femininity. In other words, scent has pretty much always been sexualized-so long as money was involved. (For whatever it’s worth, I walked away from that commercial wishing they’d make a version for men-a very “I’ll Have What She’s Having” kind of moment.) And a personal favorite is a television spot for Paris by Yves Saint Laurent, where Kate Moss appears to bring herself to orgasm just by writhing around in the backseat of an expensive car and clutching her perfume. Dolce & Gabbana’s fragrance Light Blue has long relied on the very visible curves and contours of whatever is underneath David Gandy’s bright white Speedo. Tom Ford’s advertising campaigns can be even more explicit-an advertisement for the scent “Tom Ford For Men” shows the bottle placed directly in front of a woman’s vulva, her legs spread wide open, her polished, red nails placed suggestively above the bottle cap. The clip usually ends with this woman ravaging the man who’s wearing it with kisses and sexual advances (he is, it’s important to note, often quite average looking).
Daniel, who asked to just be identified by his first name, defines it as “the smell of a man that’s had a long day at work, come back from a run, or just been at the gym.” Keshav Kant, a writer and editor, says it’s “the way a man or male-aligned person with good hygiene just naturally smells.” Mike Feswick, the co-creator of PHILE Magazine, defines it as “a divinely potent smell, specifically one that causes arousal and sexual pleasure.”įor years, fragrance companies have made billions of dollars off of marketing the very idea that scents help to amplify our sexuality-creating expensive potions that, they assure us, will make us smell “better.” Commercials for AXE Body Spray have depicted archetypically beautiful women, stopped dead in their tracks by catching a whiff of their brand’s latest product. The exact definition of “man scent” varies among its aficionados. It turned out that Zach was just one of many gay men who is into the concept of “man scent” (also often called “man musk”), achieved by avoiding the deodorant and manufactured fragrances that interfere with the raw, natural odors of sex. The problem wasn’t his to solve, it seemed-it was mine for judging him. Not you.” Something about the look on Zach’s face indicated he was perfectly fine that we were both here, in this meeting, sitting among his musky smell. Before I could even be horrified that I’d been caught smelling my own armpits by a coworker, he finished his sentence. “Phill,” interrupted my colleague, a gentleman named Zach. Mid-sentence, my thoughts started to race: Did I forget to wash under my arms? Did I forget deodorant? Am I nervous or something? Why does that smell so bad? Once it was someone else’s turn to speak, I tried to discreetly assess my underarms, lifting the collar of my t-shirt ever so subtly and taking a quick inhale.
I was leading a meeting at work a little over a year ago, and as I made a wide gesticulation, I caught a whiff of a ripe, pungent odor that could only have come from a very active, unwashed armpit. It may be a cliché that scent is the sense most strongly tied to memory, but from experience I know it is also indisputably true-particularly when it mingles with embarrassment.